nd I am
astonished at Mr. Benson. To keep his doors shut as he has, and then to
open them in a burst to all sorts of folly. We are not invited at our
house."

"Nor we, nor we," shouted some half dozen.

"And I don't know of any one in this town who is," cried a burly man,
presumably a butcher by trade. "We are not good enough for the Bensons.
They say he is even going to be mean enough to shut the gates and not
let a soul inside who hasn't a ticket. And they are going to light up
the grounds too!"

"We can peep through the fence."

"Much we will see that way. If you had said climb it--"

"We can't climb it. Big John is going to be there and Tom Henshaw. They
mean to keep their good times to themselves, just as they have kept
every thing else. It's a queer set they are anyway, and the less we
have to do with them the better."

"I should like to see Hartley Benson in masquerade costume, I would."

"Oh, he won't wear any of the fol-de-rol; he's too dignified." And with
that there fell a sudden hush over the crowd, for which I was at a loss
to account, till, upon looking up, I saw approaching on horseback, a
young man in whom I had no difficulty in recognizing the subject of the
last remark.

Straight, slight, elegant in appearance, but with an undoubted reserve
of manner apparent even at a distance, he rode up to where I stood, and
casting a slight glance around, bowed almost imperceptibly, and
alighted. A boy caught the bridle of his horse, and Mr. Benson, without
a word or further look, passed quickly into the office, leaving a
silence behind him that was not disturbed till he returned with what was
evidently his noonday mail. Remounting his horse, he stopped a moment to
speak to a man who had just come up, and I seized the opportunity to
study his face. I did not like it. It was handsome without doubt; the
features were regular, the complexion fair, the expression gentlemanly
if not commanding; but I did not like it. It was too impenetrable
perhaps; and to a detective anxious to probe a man for his motives, this
is ever a most fatal defect. His smile was without sunshine; his glance
was an inquiry, a rebuke, a sarcasm, every thing but a revelation. As he
rode away he carried with him the thought of all, yet I doubt if the
admiration he undoubtedly inspired, was in a single case mixed with any
warmer feeling than that of pride in a fellow townsman they could not
understand. "Ice," thought I; "ice in all but its